


In Hell

by evilever_green



Series: A Steep Descent [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Cliffs of Insanity, Dean in Hell, Demons Are Assholes, Dissociation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Hell Fic, Hope vs. Despair, Hurt Dean, Inner Strength, M/M, Multi, Mutilation, NOTHING IS AS IT SEEMS, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Other, Psychological Torture, Psychotropic Drugs, Rape, Resilience, Torture, demons masquerading as people, victorious Dean
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-24
Updated: 2016-03-26
Packaged: 2018-04-17 05:58:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 9,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilever_green/pseuds/evilever_green
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <br/>
  <span class="spoiler">
    <span class="small">...in the dizzying spin of memories his physical pain diminishes to a steady background glow. His Sam-the real Sam-never pressed the issue. It always left Dean with the feeling of descending a flight of stairs and missing a step. The thought twists, sickening, in his gut, followed by Sam's-Alastair's-muscular fingers digging into his abdomen until they've burned their way through his flesh and into his core, twisting his intestines. Dean howls. Then Alistair-Sam-smiles, and Dean breaks from what's happening. He leans back against the monster, using the last of his strength to bury his nose in the familiar scent of Sam's neck...</span>
  </span>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Postmortem

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not writing chapters in order, but I'll sort them chronologically as I update:
> 
> ♣ = latest
> 
> #####  1\. PYRAMID
> 
> 1.1 [Postmortem](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/14538835), 1.2 [Falling](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/10631499), 1.3 welcome to hell, 1.4 dean starts a riot (jesse), 1.5 gets burned alive
> 
> #####  2\. BLACK SAND
> 
> 2.1 [Black Sand](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/10619253), 2.2 escape, 2.3 (incomplete), 2.4 demon days, 2.5 retribution, 2.6 a lesson in physics, 2.7 something forgotten
> 
> #####  3\. ALASTAIR
> 
> 3.1 [Dr. Alastair](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/14565100), 3.2 pimply bastard, 3.3 multiple-personality fuck (incomplete), 3.4 sunlight, 3.5 therapy
> 
> #####  4\. SAMMY
> 
> 4.1 Drugs (incomplete), 4.2 [Wearing Your Face](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/10619844), 4.3, 4.4, 4.5
> 
> #####  5\. KNIFE
> 
> 5.1 the face in the walls, 5.2 why, 5.3 slippery hands (incomplete)
> 
> #####  6\. BLUR
> 
> 6.1 [The Great After](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/21136349), 6.2 [Lunatic](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/21138065)♣, Blue incomplete, 6.5 [Ruby](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4655253/chapters/21465680)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam cries, and Dean falls.   
> 

Dean blinks down at his body, flesh cut in ribbons from the hound's claws.

Sam's crying.

The sound's gone all weird, like he's listening to echoes of Sam sobbing over the radio. It's disorienting.

He kneels by his brother to tell him it's okay and becomes aware of a woman standing behind him. He whirls, prepared to face another demon, but she appears ordinary. Worn out, maybe. And pretty. But not a demon.

His ears ring, and she flashes before him, now translucent and bone-white, clothes hanging in dead strips about her as the image roars. A moment later, she reverts to the form of a woman.

A reaper, then.

Her hair falls smooth and dark around her face. He takes in her soft leather jacket, low-cut top, tight jeans. She really is pretty—pretty and hot. _As Hell,_ his brain supplies unhelpfully. He thinks he'd probably try talking to her if Sam weren't still crying at his feet.

She watches him like she's waiting for something. He gets the odd feeling she expects him to recognize her. He doesn't.

His eyes flick between his fate and his brother. She's looking on sadly. Sam folds Dean's arms over the deep gouges through his ruined chest. He stops, covering his mouth with one bloodied hand, and bows his head over Dean's corpse, shaking uncontrollably.

Dean reaches out to touch Sammy's trembling shoulder. His hand passes through.

"He can't—"

"I know," Dean says firmly.

She gives him a moment, but he knows it's time to leave.

Fuck, he doesn't want to leave Sam like this. He wonders if he made the right decision. Then he remembers it wouldn't have mattered—burying his brother would have killed him soon enough.

He follows the pretty, haunted woman, walking backwards until Sam's out of sight, memorizing his tearstained face.

They head outside, and into the street, which starts to gape. As the slit widens, it belches out furnace-hot smog that reeks of sulfur. He hears the grind of an ancient machine, accompanied by the slow clang of heavy chains slithering through it.

She gives him an odd look, like she's disappointed—and who the Hell is _she_?—then points commandingly at the fissure in the earth. Cars, busses, pedestrians, all pass like the world isn't splitting in two.

Her regard turns to a glare as he watches her, wanting to plead for something, but he doesn't know exactly what to ask for. Another minute with his brother? A do-over? More time? More time. A moment to think of a last request. Her eyes soften, but she keeps pointing.

"So what do I... do I just, fall over the edge?" His voice sounds tiny, submerged in the empty moan welling up from below.

She nods.

He scrubs a hand over his face. "All right," he says, sounding more resolute than he feels. Sam's right, this was a bad idea. Down that hole, there are bad things. Evil things. A core of evil that oozes up and taints the earth.

He can already feel it crawling underneath his skin.

She's still watching him, and he's struck again with the impression that she knows him, but he couldn't say from where. "Dean," she says gently, "Don't let them break you."

He nods, eyes flicking back to her after a moment. God, she looks familiar. Is he supposed to understand what she means?

She brushes her fingers against his cheek with what could easily be mistaken for affection ( _reapers don't feel it_ , he reminds himself). Everything spins.

When the spinning slows, an emaciated old man in a smart, pressed-black suit strides over the growing rift with a single step like it isn't there. He takes Dean's arm, flickers like a hologram, and leads him to the edge.

"I suppose this is harder since you already know a great deal about where you're going," he says conversationally.

Dean sets his jaw. The man regards him with curiosity.

"For some, you will be a beacon of hope," he muses cryptically, turning his old, staring-dark eyes on Dean— _phantom heartbeat kicks up in his chest, dread uncoils low in his belly_ —"Others may not wish to be reminded of their lost freedom." Then he flickers out, and the spinning accelerates. The gash in the earth yawns open. Dean stumbles back, trying to right himself, but it keeps widening. He falls.


	2. Falling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll put special warnings on a few of the chapters I guess, but almost all of them will be bloody and contain elements of psychological torture.

He wakes up sore, bloody, and still falling.

His back slams into heavy chains which move to trap him. They twist him into their notches, sliding over him like snakes as an enormous hook thrusts itself into his back, piercing clear through to the front. He expects to die but he doesn't. Oh God, he doesn't. He screams Sam's name as his mouth fills with blood.

A giant machine made of chains and hooks rips him to pieces and he falls, his body coming back together like the shit in the bottom of a kaleidoscope. And fuck if his body sticking itself back together doesn't hurt worse than being ripped apart. He's caught by another set of hooks on another set of chains, and they pull until everything in him ruptures, and he's falling again.

This continues in a numbing rhythm as he descends. The scenery doesn't change—he's still looking up at a crack that reveals the sun, staring, knowing once it blinks out he'll never see it again. He watches the light grow distant. The air thickens.

Dean's starting to feel bored when it stops. He hits the ground hard, shattering a leg and busting his nose. He pushes up on his arms and the knee that isn't hanging at a weird angle, surveying his surroundings.

He seems to be at the top of a pyramid. His brain tilts sickly, trying to make mathematical sense of falling onto the summit of such a large structure. He crawls to the edge, dragging his useless leg behind him, and peers over.

He gradually becomes aware—as his ears stop ringing—of sounds from the city below. He thinks it's a city, since he can't see anything through the thick blackness shrouding it. He can't gauge the height of the pyramid, either, but its height seems at least equal to that of a city block. Maybe a city block in West Virginia.

Vertigo hits him suddenly as he thinks of home, and he scrambles back, clutching at a light, smooth rock behind him. He feels sutures on the rock, and lifts it to his face to discover it's part of a human skull. He tosses it away, disgusted. It clicks against the edge of the summit, then falls out of sight. He listens as it drops, hoping to gauge the distance to what he assumes is Hell's primary Visitor Center. He bets they make shitty maps.

The skull keeps echoing as it falls into the abyss, further and further away, yet somehow still audible.

Then, silence. A shadow darkens the block masonry before him.

"Hello, Dean."

Dean steels himself, taking some small comfort in the fact that he can't place the voice. Actually, he's not sure he's ever heard anything so... _nasally_.

"You must be the welcoming committee," he says, smiling bitterly. His hunter instinct tells him to turn and face his enemy, but a deeper, more primal instinct tells him not to look. He shuts his eyes, supposes it doesn't matter if he gets hurt here. Because that's pretty much a given, right?

An iron grip catches the back of his neck and lifts him to his feet. The man—demon, he reminds himself—leans by his ear as he struggles not to put weight on his shattered limb. He smells sulfur and blood and something else, a faint smell from home. He can't quite place it, but he knows it doesn't belong here.

"I've been waiting a long time for this," the man coos in his ear. "You and I... we're going to have fun together."

"I'll bet," he returns.

The man hurls him over the precipice before Dean can see his face.


	3. Black Sand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> > “See, the soul, it’s made of light. For the sake of argument, just say that light’s powered by love, or empathy, or something.” He paused to mop his brow. A guard stared meaningfully at him, then shifted his gaze to the furnace roaring behind him. Jesse got the picture.
>> 
>> “Okay, soul’s run by something warm and fuzzy.” Dean said, hoping Jesse’d move his ass. Getting burned alive sucked a helluva lot more than getting crushed by limestone—he would know. “So doing bad shit… what, burns out your soul-lamp, or something?”
>> 
>> “More or less. As far as I can tell, it’s not mere ‘bad deeds' as described by conventional morality. It’s the… inhuman stuff. Torture. Enslavement. Genocide.”
>> 
>> “Okay. I think I get it.” Dean nodded, wishing his teachers had been more like this guy.
>> 
>> “And when the light goes out, the soul dissipates, turns to smoke and darkness. It allows the soul to move between bodies. Then you can possess people… and shit,” he said with an irreverent wink. Dean grinned.

They designed Hell’s First City like an enormous correctional facility: an open central area ringed by neighborhoods carved in bare rock face. Below the main area, demons hold souls in cinderblock cells, partially visible through long grates in the floor. The corporeal body ceases to matter once you die—in fact, Dean suspects his body’s not real, the way they keep ripping him apart and re-assembling him—but lower-level demons lack psychological torture skills, so bodies give them something to entertain themselves with. And whoever set up this creepy carnival decided it’d be fun if people still needed to eat, and shower, and crap. So, after being broken and healed, demons corral souls into the open central area to take care of their bodily needs. Jesse says it’s to “keep up morale—if you got no hope, they can’t break you.” Of course, Jesse’s not here today.

Dean eats whatever the fuck they put on his tray—some kind of greasy mush, which he finds tolerable, provided he doesn’t look at it—and casts furtive looks past the caverns. A long stretch of dark sand, probably two or three miles of it, glitters in the golden light from the top of the pyramid. He remembers how he got into Hell. Maybe he can escape the same way. He wonders why nobody’s trying it.

He looks around at the people sharing a table with him. Most of them stare sightlessly at their trays. A few of them shiver. A pretty but haggard woman glances at him with round, deep-blue eyes. In another universe, that look would convey interest. He meets her eyes, wondering how she got down here. The shame of it is, a lot of these people didn’t do anything too awful. A lot made deals with demons, but they’re not the scum of the earth or anything. He supposes the world’s rapists, murderers, and child molesters turn to demons quicker. Jesse explained how that happens:

“See, the soul, it’s made of light,” he said with his Texas twang as they loaded chunks of limestone into the bed of a truck, knowing full well that when the truck was full it’d drive up the mountain of caverns stacked like beehives and dump its load on their heads. And fuck if dying doesn’t hurt just as bad the second time. And the third. And the hundredth.

“For the sake of argument,” Jesse panted, “just say that light’s powered by love, or empathy, or something.” He paused to mop his brow. A guard stared meaningfully at him, then shifted his gaze to the furnace roaring behind them. Jesse got the picture.

“Okay, soul’s run by something warm and fuzzy.” Dean said, hoping Jesse’d move his ass. Getting burned alive sucked a helluva lot more than getting crushed by limestone—he would know.

“Right.” To his relief, Jesse got back to work.

Dean started hefting the bigger chunks of limestone that Jesse couldn’t handle as easily. “So doing bad shit… what, burns out your soul-lamp, or something?”

“More or less. As far as I can tell, it’s not mere ‘bad deeds' as described by conventional morality,” Jesse continued, glancing appreciatively at Dean as his slim arms strained with a smaller piece. “It’s the… inhuman stuff that consumes the soul's light. Torture. Enslavement. Genocide.”

“Okay. I think I get it.” Dean nodded, wishing his teachers had been more like this guy.

“And when the light goes out, the soul dissipates, turns to smoke and darkness.” Jesse grunted in pain as he pulled his back. Dean knew better than to help him with all those demons watching, but he managed to tip the main limestone pile over as a distraction. As the dust settled, Jesse crouched with him to clean it up. “Darkness…” he started again slowly, “it allows the soul to move between bodies. Then you can possess people… and shit,” he said with an irreverent wink. Dean grinned.

He thinks about it now, stirring his mush absently and looking at the blue-eyed woman. Your soul burns away and you cease to be yourself; you become more Hell than human. That scares him more than anything he’s seen so far. But Dean ain’t going easy, that’s for sure.

The woman twitches her mouth into something resembling a smile, then looks away. Dean goes back to gazing at that pyramid. It sure as hell looks easy, provided he can outrun the demon hordes that’ll try to pull him back to the city. He figures he’ll do it at night.

The black sand shines like obsidian. Compared with the drudgery of the city, it’s stunningly beautiful. The pyramid looks greenish-gold, mottled-brown of dried blood obscured from this distance.

_Sam’s eyes glittered beetle-black, blown with arousal. The ring of hazel around his dilated pupils looked gold in the light from the hall..._

Dean forces the memory from his mind. Ascending the pyramid itself won’t be easy—if he recalls correctly, it’s probably miles high, narrow steps slick with blood. A fall would shatter every bone in his body and leave him vulnerable. Not to mention, Dean doesn’t know how to to open the door if he makes it to the top.

He decides that, even if he fails, he’ll at least get a chance to examine the door. He checks the path to the pyramid for physical obstacles: no barbed wire, no dogs, no sign of explosives that he can make out. So there’s something else that deters people from trying to escape.

He doesn’t care. He’s doing it.


	4. Dr. Alastair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> >   
>  At length, he calms, and, smearing a dirty fist over his eyes, takes comfort in the knowledge that his smudged griminess probably obliterates any evidence of his breakdown. To his dismay, his eyes pick this moment to spot the bookcase loaded with psychology textbooks behind Alastair's second tool chest...  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I'm not posting chapters in order... see table of contents for more info

Dean wakes up dizzy. He vomits several times before they drag him out of his cell.

Frankly, he couldn’t tell you how many months— _years?_ —he’s spent rotting in Hell. Not because he never devised a system for marking each passing day—he did, but he’s long since neglected it. Just stopped counting.

Not that you’d bother asking _him_ anyway.

He surveys the bustling compound with indifference. He no longer recognizes the wailing, the desperate begging, the pleas for _mercy_. The smells of filth and misery waft by him unnoticed. The realization that he’s now enduring the constant companionship of two additional guards doesn’t move him in the slightest. They crowd him, pushing into his space, rubbing and bumping him in ways that should be obnoxious, even obscene, and he thinks, _whatever_. But then,

“Dad?”

They’re being marched in opposite directions, practically on a collision course across a vast stretch of compound, but Dean would recognize the face of John Winchester anywhere.

He shoves one of the guards away and walks tall, with a bit of a swagger. Even in his tattered white t-shirt, he knows he stands out like this—he feels the eyes of others lingering on him, sizing him up. But his father won’t meet his eyes.

“Dad! Da—” One of his escorts punches him in the gut. He gasps for breath, straightens (using the guard restraining his arms for leverage), and appears to collect himself before expelling all the air from his lungs in one piercing shout:

“DAD!”

But his father’s face remains averted. For an ugly minute, Dean feels certain that John Winchester actually _intends_ to ignore the familiar cries of his eldest son. His chest cramps.

As his father draws near—dreadfully, unmistakably near—Dean’s soul slides into wretched despair. Then, just as they get abreast of each other, John grabs his jaw. “Don't try to escape again!" he barks in Dean’s face. His voice still carries its old command despite the hoarseness. Then his abrupt anger subsides, and he adds in a miserable, breaking moan, "Don't make me watch that again, Dean."

Dean blinks, not sure what he's referring to, and they're being torn apart. His father takes a knee to the groin and crumples. As he drops, he finally looks at Dean. He looks up at his boy with eyes full of tears and dark-brown irises a shade too pale. _Faded_.

"I'm still proud of you, son," he manages, straining, before a black-eyed demon grunts, "Get him out of here," and he's thrown down one of the cavernous halls.

Dean's hustled through the caverns too, but uphill—he figures they're taking him to Alastair's "study." His brain takes a moment to process what just happened, but then he realizes his father's here too, enduring the shit he's enduring. Maybe worse. Suddenly, it's all too much.

When Dean's shoved to his knees in Alastair's doorway, his cheeks are wet.

 _Dammit Dean, you promised yourself you wouldn't cry. What happened to_ Never Let Those Bastards Win?

 _The fuck is Dad proud of anyway_.

 _God, Dad,_ he thinks.  _If I'd just died the first time like I should've, then you wouldn't even be here._

Now that he's started crying he can't seem to fucking stop. He hates it. Hates that Alastair's just standing there, watching him. He stoops so he's facing the floor, and watches as the tears drip more slowly from the tip of his nose. He concentrates on the drips until he calms down. Oddly, he's able to appreciate that Alastair doesn't try to comfort him. Because that would just be retarded.

Alastair also waits to torture him. Lets him cry. He wonders, pathetically, if the demon lord might show a little mercy this time.

_Yeah, right._

At length, he finds equilibrium and, smearing a dirty fist over his eyes, takes comfort in the knowledge that his smudged griminess probably obliterates any evidence of his breakdown. To his dismay, his eyes pick this moment to spot the bookcase loaded with psychology textbooks behind Alastair's second tool chest.

_Son of a bitch._

“Dean… welcome home…” Alastair hums. “You look like you’re finally ready… to begin today’s session…”

“Whatever,” he mutters darkly. “Let’s just get on with it.”

“Such rudeness… to someone who welcomes you graciously…”

Dean spits on his floor.

Alastair clucks his tongue, approaching lazily. "Have you ever ridden a horse, Dean?" he drawls, then continues without allowing time to respond. "Sometimes you find a handsome steed… and it makes you want to ride him more often… Almost like a friend," he adds soothingly. "Except… he still exists purely for your entertainment and… _edification_." He hooks a finger under Dean's chin, tilting his face up, inspecting him. "I think you'll find I'm a big proponent of... education..." With his thumb, he lifts Dean's upper lip as if to check his teeth.  _You've gotta be kidding me,_ Dean thinks, narrowing his eyes and twisting his face out of reach.

Alastair may have a lagging, sleepy demeanor, but he moves like lightning. Dean sees stars as the back of his head cracks against the floor. Realizes he got taken down as the clammy hand leaves his throat. A chill runs through him.

"You're forgetting something," Alastair croons.

_Something forgotten._

_A man who looks like him writhes against the floor, fingers scrabbling for purchase across blood-slick rubber_ —not his blood—

His eyes fly open. Nausea returns and he rolls to the side, clutching his head until it passes.

"Manners, Dean..." Alastair pulls the hem of his shirt down where it's ridden up.

Dean slaps his palm against the tile. The sound gives him strength to struggle into a sitting position, arms behind him for support. And Alastair watches him too fucking closely. He meets the demon's eyes, fixing him with a stare that could wilt roses.

"You're not a gift horse, after all..." Alastair smiles dreamily at his own joke before continuing. "You're more like an unruly colt”—he directs his pale gaze downwards—“that needs to be broken."

Dean blinks, realizing it took him a minute to feel disgusted. He'd been looking at Alastair when... he wanted to know... what did he want to know?  _Weaknesses_ , he thinks, concentrating.  _Have to find his weaknesses. Find. Exploit. Repeat. How to take down a tyrant? Why am I getting so off topic?_

"That's it, Dean," Alastair murmurs soothingly. Fortunately, Dean doesn't find him soothing at all, and snaps out of it, averting his eyes. Shit, he forgot some demons have hypnotic abilities. Just his luck that this one's so fascinated by him.

He knows it'll be harder to find the chink in his armor if he can't make eye contact, but that mojo worked pretty fast—better not to risk it.

The demon chuckles. "You're pretty," he says matter-of-factly, trailing his fingers across Dean's cheek.

Dean suppresses a shudder, holding very still. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Alastair beam.


	5. Wearing Your Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> > ...in the dizzying spin of memories his physical pain diminishes to a steady background glow. His Sam-the real Sam-never pressed the issue. It always left Dean with the feeling of descending a flight of stairs and missing a step. The thought twists, sickening, in his gut, followed by Sam's-Alastair's-muscular fingers digging into his abdomen until they've burned their way through his flesh and into his core, twisting his intestines. Dean howls. Then Alistair-Sam-smiles, and he fucking gives in, leaning back against him, using the last of his strength to bury his nose in the familiar scent of Sam's neck...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for rape/non-con

The pain becomes distracting—every part of his body demanding his attention—and it makes him tired. He sways, putting more and more weight on his dislocated shoulder, unable to stand on his shaky legs. He wants to cry out, but his throat's been burned by all the searing smoke.

"You'll never win," he laughs, suddenly giddy as he teeters on the edge of consciousness.

Alastair's lazy smile falters for a moment. "Why's that?" he asks, as if it were simply a passing curiosity. As if he weren't dying to know.

"Come on, man," Dean says, unable to keep himself from provoking the demon with the pointy object, "Give it a rest." He pauses, wheezing, gore rattling through his chest. Alastair arches an eyebrow. "You're always talking about how I'm your special"—cough—" _special charge_. But you're fucking delusional. We hardly even know each other. Dunno about you, but I—" he chokes, coughs up blood, spits it across Alastair's shoes. Then he sneers, showing his bloodied teeth and meeting that sonofabitch's eyes as he makes his point. "I ain't taking this personally."

A slow, jagged smile cuts across Alastair's face. He brushes gentle fingers down Dean's cheek and the pain eases—hell, the pain disappears—from most of his body. His arm still feels unusable. Dean watches the demon in amazement, and his face fucking _melts_. Despite the cortisol sludging through his body, he quickly realizes this isn't some type of nightmare. Before the features resolve, he recognizes the new face.

Sam.

He struggles, trying to back away and earning himself a powerful throb from his dislocated shoulder. This isn't happening. He isn't staring at the demon's face like he wants to kiss it. His heart isn't fluttering in his chest, isn't aching. He doesn't see home.

Sam-Alastair smiles. Oh god, he smiles. Dean gasps, clutching uselessly at his chest, not even concerned with how the demon's lapping up every sign that this new torture hurts worse than anything they've tried in Hell. He can't think about that right now, because he missed that face so badly. That smile... to Dean, it's pure sunlight.

And it blurs the lines in his brain.

"Sammy?"

"I'm here, Dean," he says. Warmth.

"It's not—you're not you," Dean tries.

"It's me, Dean."

"No—" but he's cut off, and Sam's kissing his mouth, lifting him, carrying him off to a better time. Then he's growling, pressing against him, licking his tongue.

Dean's definitely not aroused in any way.

"Oh," Alastair says in a low, gravelly voice that Sam almost never uses. "I should've tried this sooner." He watches Dean squirm. His eyes narrow with hunger.

 _Focus on the differences,_ Dean reminds himself. He manages to shove away, stumbling back until he hits the damp stone wall. A fresh stab of pain shooting down his arm fogs his brain as much as the drugs. _Damn the drugs,_ he thinks suddenly. _Easy to forget how_ hard _torture makes you while you're screaming bloody murder under Alastair's knife. Can't forget now._

He curls in on himself, trying to remember, _not Sam, not really, no sunlight in Hell..._

Sam watches him with pity, then pulls his shirt off, languid, like he's got all the time in the world. His skin's darker than when Dean last saw it—reminds him of when Sammy went off to Stanford and got all brown. Must have been the California sun. He's breathtaking.

He saunters forward, and Dean's _not_ imagining that pert little ass inside those dark jeans. "Miss me?" he says seductively against Dean's cheek.

Dean smiles bitterly. "'Course not," he says, bland, as if he were talking to Sam. As much as he hates it, it's good to see his face. His corrupted face.

It hurts because when Sammy blinks, his pupils have disappeared. Milky white decay overtakes his eyes.

"Good," he says lightly, tone approximating the one Sam uses for neutral conversations. "I don't miss you either. You know where I am right now, Dean?"

Dean struggles to put some distance between them. Alastair grabs his shoulder, digs his fingers in, and Dean's eyes water in pain. He blinks it back.

"Answer the question."

Dean's head spins. For a second he thinks he's back on earth, and he's made Sam angry. He hates making Sam angry.

He's vaguely nauseated by the fact that this demon's wearing Sam's flesh—or maybe it's the memories? They keep Dean fucked up, but whatever was in that cloth Alastair pressed to his nose... _new_. Memories pounding through his brain at a dizzying rate, flashing through his vision faster than he can recognize them. Knows he's breaking from reality but can't— _make it stop. You have to make it stop. Your name is Dean Winchester. You are in Hell. You asked for it. Remember_ this.

Alastair-Sam takes his hand. He thinks of Meg, of how Sam must've struggled to get out when he thought she was going to hurt him—

"I said," he repeats, pressing Dean's thumb back until he hears a sickening crack and pain whites out his mind for a moment. When he can see again, Alastair continues, calm as a summer sea. "Answer the question."

Dean blinks, too hazy with pain to piece together what he's supposed to say right now.

Sam purses his lips. The gesture is very Sam. The tone is not. "Do you know where I am right now?" he says slowly, as if Dean were stupid.

"With me?" Dean guesses.

"Wrong." Sam's lips, feather light, move down his cheek, down his jaw, settle half a centimeter from his lips. "But I am with someone. We're getting together," he can feel the air shift as Sam smiles, "in the biblical sense. Right now. Can you guess who I'm with?"

Dean doesn't want to play. He throws out the first name that comes to his brain that isn't _Sam._ "Ruby."

Sam backs up, searching his eyes.

_No._

His stomach drops and he's bathed in ice.

"Good guess," Sam murmurs, eyeing Dean's lips.

"No," Dean manages. It's not true. Alastair's just a good actor. Because _why the fuck would Sam sleep with Ruby._ It must be the drugs that are making that even seem plausible.

But the demon— _loves to gloat, smug bastard_ —looks too curious, too shocked, for Dean to have guessed wrong.

Sam catches his mouth in a harsh, biting kiss. "It's true," he says, "but I'll have to take you on a little field trip to prove it. Just think," he slides his hands down Dean's sides, slipping his fingers just inside Dean's waistband. "If you're good we'll go watch them some time."

"No," Dean repeats, more strongly this time. Sam would never _do_ that. Plus, being able to see his brother—knowing they will never speak, touch, hunt together, play pranks on each other, get plastered, enjoy the open road, or watch the stars again—would be unbearable.

Alastair presses his other thumb back. Dean winces. "You always pretended you didn't want it," he says, pushing threateningly, ready to break his other thumb. "Didn't you?"

Dean bites his tongue, hating himself. He nods.

Alastair breaks his finger anyway.

Dean pants against the black agony in his hand as Alastair continues to press the shattered digit backwards. His panting is disrupted by another kiss, mind-bendingly soft, and he chokes. The conscious thoughts he has still center around Sam and Ruby. And fuck, Sam's probably attracted to her meatsuit. That thought fades into the noise rushing through his brain, demanding air ( _Why can't I breathe again?_ ) and a tear rolls, unchecked, down his cheek.

"Good boy," Alastair says. Another tear follows in its track.

That hurts too.

Then he's being untied, shoved up against the wall. He knows where this is going. He closes his eyes so he won't see his mangled thumbs as he braces himself with his hands.

Alastair takes him against the wall, dry (at first, then hot and tacky with his blood). Dean grinds his head against the cement blocks, trying to block out the scent—he fucking _smells_ like Sam, that same heavy, masculine smell Sam got when he was turned on. His cock fills a little despite the pain, and he finds himself leaning into the offending touch, mind skidding back to his last month on earth.

_Sam's pissed. He advances, nostrils flared, and Dean backs away because his little brother's fucking scary sometimes. Sam presses him against the wall. His groin has the most fucked up, Pavlovian response to that—it gets heavy. Sam presses his nose into the soft hairs on the back of Dean's head._

_"Don't," he hisses, and Sam backs off._

_That_ was torture.

This Sam gets a hand around Dean's throat, digging poker-hot fingers into the side of his face and pulling. The irony of it strikes Dean, and he almost laughs as his mouth fills with blood. Alastair can't torture him properly because he doesn't understand Sam. Then again, perhaps he wouldn't be thinking of Sam at all right now if Alastair hadn't decided to fuck him wearing Sam's face.

 _When life's constant torture, you center yourself in the oddest things_ , he thinks, sudden inner peace making him philosophical. The familiar rhythm of the thrusts, Sam's smell, heck, even the throb of ceaseless pain all work to soothe him. In his new calm, he sees himself again in that motel room, telling Sam they never should've done that—never should have gone down that road. By that he means, they never should've fucked.

_For a second, he almost tries to blame his decision to go to Hell on their sexual relationship. But damn, he's scared—he knows where he's going and he's terrified—and he feels bad a minute later. Sam watches him like he can read his mind. Which, Dean reminds himself, he sorta can._

He's mostly hard now, and in the dizzying spin of memories his physical pain drops to a steady background glow. Sam never pressed the issue. It always left Dean with the feeling of descending a flight of stairs and missing a step. Maybe he'd wanted Sam to force him. The thought twists, sickening, in his gut, followed by Sam's (Alistair's) muscular fingers digging into his abdomen until they've burned their way through his flesh, into his core. They twist his intestines. Dean howls. Then Alistair (Sam) smiles, and he fucking gives in, leaning back against him, using the last of his strength to turn his head so his nose is buried in the familiar scent of Sam's neck.

He doesn't know how much time passes. Seconds? Hours? Weeks?

Dean collapses on the floor—not for the first time—with Sam's cum dripping out of his ass.

"You can make this stop, you know" Alastair reminds him in Sam's voice. He's heading out, abandoning Dean to his pain and his lurching memories.

But Alastair loses again. Dean's not broken. He thinks he might've _enjoyed_ it.

He manages to flip himself over, pushing with his legs until his back's propped against the wall, holding his intestines gently in place since they're obscuring his nudity. He smiles at Alastair warmly, a bit mechanically, but with no malice. Alastair hates that smile because he can't read it. He just lacks that skill. He's just not Sam-fucking-Winchester.

"See you tomorrow," Dean croaks.

Alastair keeps his face composed and turns on his heel, but Dean knows he's furious.


	6. The Great After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dean appears to have escaped Hell by some mysterious force. He's reunited with his brother, but something still isn't right...

_Dean is, reborn in a grave._

_He inspects his body and finds it new. He inspects his memories and finds them fractured. KNIFEPYRAMIDDOCTORPAINFORGOTTENESCAPEBLOODDRUGSDESPAIRACHESAMMY_

_He inspects the world around him and finds it the same._

_But the hellscape remains, a glittering stretch of black sand before the high, golden pyramid, waiting just beyond the webbed veil of consciousness._

_And sometimes a mild breeze blows it back, and he can't tell the difference..._

 

* * *

 

01

"Why'd Bobby leave?" Dean scratches the back of his head. "It's not like we're gonna fuck, or anything." Catching Sam's smirk, he carefully makes his own face blank.

"Yeah, that just wouldn't happen. Dude, you're like, a corpse."

"I look pretty damn good for a corpse."

Sam chuckles. "Yeah, you do."

And Dean's caught himself staring at Sam's mouth. He clears his throat and looks away. "So, you uh, got a girl?" _At least it's not Ruby,_ he thinks, trying to picture the brown-eyed chick that'd been here earlier.

Sam snorts. "Trust me - not a girl."

Dean wrinkles his nose. "The Hell's that supposed to mean?"

Sam claps a hand on his knee. "Never mind." He gets up and stretches. "You need anything?"

"Hey, what's your rush? I just got back from the dead!"

"I'm horny," Sam shrugs. "Gotta take care of it."

Dean gapes. As Sam turns to leave, he hears himself say, "You could, you know, stick around for a bit."

Sam's grin seems slightly sadistic. "Is that an invitation?"

Sam, smiling. Dean finds himself admiring Sam's powerful arms. He can feel Sam getting closer, knows he should probably move out of the way because a collision at this point might be cataclysmic, but as it roars towards him he doesn't move.

 

***

 

Sam kisses him, lazy goodness and slow, like sex the third time, and it hurts worse than hellfire. Chills him to his soul.

Dean can't get hard anymore when Sam fucks him, but it doesn't matter. When they collide it's full of need and sadness, and his flagging erection dribbles cum on the mattress every time Sam reminds him of all the things he's lost.

 

***

 

Dean sneers. "Here I thought you'd managed some self-control."

"It's you," his brother says softly, with a kiss to his cheek. As if that explains it.

"What's that supposed to mean," he grunts.

"You tell me," Sam laughs. Dean shakes his head furiously. Then Sam's tickling him. He squirms. Sam rolls him onto his back.

Their laughter trails off. Dean finds that strangely hypnotic steadiness in Sam's eyes. Thinks he missed that, in Hell.

As he watches, the light flickers.

The world drops out from under him as the light goes out behind Sam's eyes and his brain screams warning:

_HALLUCINATINGSTILLINHELL—_

and he hauls off and punches his baby brother in the mouth.

Sam just grabs him and holds him til he stops shuddering. But the revulsion's still there... _oh god, what if his Sam is tainted forever? Our Father, our absent Father._

 

***

 

The shrieks, carried always by the fitful winds of Hell, have begun to fade into memory.

"Dean? Hey, man, focus... I'm right here. Hey."

Sam's beautiful eyes. Same pretty eyes he had as a baby. God, the light in them...

Dean frowns, distrustful. "Why'd you do that so fast."

"Do what, Dean?" Sam's voice, gentle as always but with a discernible note of despair under that soothing familiar...

Dean catches a glimpse of his hands, torn and bleeding, the writhing black of Hell trying to ooze its way into his open veins. Forces himself to look away.

They're dressed— _how'd they get dressed so fast?_   But there's nothing proprietary in Sam's touch, nothing aching in his eyes. The chasm between them suddenly feels intolerable and Dean surges forward, trying to drive the gaps from his mind. Kissing his little brother's mouth, so like the first time, and so different.

"Dean—" Sam gasps, between kisses, "Dean wait. Hey, man, slow down."

Sam, pulling them to their feet, tilting Dean's head back as he kisses him. Then empty air, inexplicable, and Dean's thrown back onto the bed.

"Told you to wait," Sam pants. In a small but revealing gesture, Sam wipes the back of his hand across his mouth.

Dean says, "I remember _this_ ," and the world tilts sideways.

 

***

 

When he gets back from Hell, Sam wastes no time getting him in the sack. The speed of it, the violence, leaves Dean's head spinning.

But damn, his brother's got stamina. Dean's still panting, spent and exhausted, wondering how to coax Sam's weight off him without moving or speaking (he even makes a weak attempt at telekinesis, because hey, weirder things have worked out for him) when Sam's rutting against him again. Dean wants to blurt, _What's the rush, man, I just got back_ , but the words stick in his throat. Sam acts like he might disappear at any moment. Fuck, he knows how that feels. So he just grunts at the dull ache in his gut as his brother pounds into him, waiting for him to finish because the last time Sammy got out of bed, Dean's back felt cold. Apparently that's a thing. Who knew.

 

***

 

Dean gets up, pulls on his underwear and a t-shirt, and starts to pace. Sam watches him.

Dean feels him looking but averts his eyes, knowing Sammy's bewitching sprawl, long and tan, weight back on his elbows, feet stretched carelessly before him, knees apart. Sam's biting his lip and narrowing his eyes and daring Dean to glance over—to get whammied.

"I can't believe we started this again," he blurts without meaning to.

"What's wrong with it?" Sam's grin matches his tone: half-lazy, half-challenging.

Dean massages his forehead, like that'll ease the pain of having to explain this out loud. "It's just, Sam... all of our problems start here." _And eventually, when shit hits the fan, the shadows between us will drive us apart._ Dean doesn't like it when they're not talking.

"I haven't even been back from the dead twenty-four hours and we're fucking," Dean says.

"Thought you said it was a coping mechanism. That you needed it."

Dean frowns. "Doesn't sound like something I'd say."

"You said it, like, an hour ago—Dean, are you forgetting things?"

"Never mind," he says quickly.

His brother regards him with concern, and Dean's caught looking at him again. Sam, sprawling, running fingers through floppy hair, and—

And fuck if Dean isn't horny again. The ache in his balls, his ass, his head, his heart—it's all suddenly too much, and he steps back. "I- I need some air," he says, rushing for his clothes, yanking on pants and grabbing a jacket.

Sam shrugs, and Dean all but runs for the door.

He wanders down the block, to a park with empty swings. He sits on one of them, leaning his head against the chain, thinking. Sam used to be so sentimental.

"What the hell's wrong with him?" he asks his hands.


	7. Lunatic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dean appears to have escaped Hell by some mysterious force. He's reunited with his brother, but something still isn't right...

"You think I wanted this? You think I wanted to come back when the price for me was... God Dean, I didn't just have to _watch you die_. I had to know you were going to Hell and it was my fault! You think, what, give it some time and Sam'll just go back to normal?"

Dean keeps his mouth shut.

Sam, cheeks flushed, saying slowly, "I'd rather be dead." He pulls back long enough for Dean to draw a shuddering breath.

"Sam," he rasps, "Sammy."

"I'll stop if you beg me to."

Dean squeezing his eyes shut. No matter the physical pain or even the humiliation, he can't beg. Sam knows that.

Darkness swims at the edges of his vision.

He manages to say, "Hell's where I belong for seducing my little brother." And once again, as the world spins sickeningly around its axis, he's living deja vu.

 

***

 

 _That didn't just happen_ , Dean tells himself.

"Sam," he croaks, "Sammy?"

And Sam's there, kissing his face. His cheeks are wet where Dean touches them.

"Ssh Sammy it's okay. Don't cry."

Sam, kissing him.

He lies in bed, going over what just happened. He sees their shadows on the ceiling, colliding with one another.

That would be one of Alastair's favorite scenes to recreate:

He'd send in a special "Sam," one with maggots for eyes. Or one that was just slightly different, which attempted to systematically eradicate Sam's humanity from Dean's mind.

Alastair missed numerous tricks, but on some level he might have understood that Dean valued Sam's humanity above all of his other qualities. Qualities that waxed and waned comprised Sam's surface—a mosaic of troubled, empathetic, sexy, controlling, smart, angry, temperamental, generous, independent—typical human state of flux magnified by the steady flow of fucked up shit that Sam witnessed and endured, (rendered brilliant by the same hoodoo that made him _Sam)_. Underneath all that, perhaps governing it, prowled something simpler, wilder.

Alastair might have known that Dean found it sexually attractive.

Alastair pumped him full of psychedelic crap that gave him nightmares, and Dean saw his brother with new clarity. Sam glowed, warm and impulsive. In the face of Alastair's mechanical heat, his languid, constant torture, Dean found his sanctuary in Sam's steady chaos.

 _Seasons,_ he thought. _Sam has seasons, snow, rain, drought, wind._ Alastair, at his best, emulated a perpetual desert. Alastair asked him if he frightened him, and, though Dean often said yes just for a change of pace, he can only remember feeling true fear once.

He's dragged back there now, head lolling to one side as his broken body sends a thousand warnings. But he's tapped out his reserves of fear, anxiety, pain, self-preservation, and probably sanity. He takes comfort in the familiar taste of blood, the familiar haziness of sleep deprivation augmented and twisted by drug-induced hallucinations, the familiar aches in all the choice places—fingers, bottoms of feet, backs of knees, genitals, rectum, eyes, mouth. This is his home now. Bored by the monotony of his surroundings, he focuses on his brother.

Sam. Sammy. Storming off then coming home.

Enraged then indifferent. Worried then placid.

Following Dean's orders, then following his own heart.

Shoving Dean away, only to pull him into bed the next night.

Overbearing, possessive, then coaxing, uncertain. Fast then slow.

Steady chaos.

Dean lets these wash over him like the tide, and finally he experiences Sam's presence. He thinks he's imagining it at first. Sam just sits next to him, pressing their shoulders together, waiting for Dean to figure it out.

Dean's heart twists with recognition mere moments before Sam rises to leave.

Dean grabs the hem of his brother's pants. Without his tongue, all he can do is gurgle on his blood.

Sam turns, crouches next to him. "I can't stay, Dean, someone will catch me. I'll try to come back," he says, kissing Dean's forehead.

"Sammy?" Dean tries to say, stumbling a bit as he wavers between reality and hallucination. He tries to get up and follow Sammy, but his legs won't hold him. He falls, half a foot from the door, hand stretched across the threshold. His body responds to his mental commands the way a block of wood might.

 _He was just here,_ he thinks.

He stays that way for a long time. When Alastair comes back, he claps his hands together, heals him promptly, and says, "Today's your lucky day, kid."

"Whaddaya mean," Dean mutters, suspicious. His tongue feels thick from disuse.

"I'm giving you the day off," Alastair beams.

"What?"

"Call it an anniversary present... like pearls..."

"Seriousl—" he's cut off by the click of his cell door.

He spends the day in rotations. His flabby mind, accustomed only to cycles of agony and relief, tries desperately to hold onto the memories of Sam. He can't keep them from slipping away. He's not sure if it's the drugs, but he can't think of words for simple things, and the feelings just fade. He sits in the corner, cradling his head until the frustration rips through him, overrides his reason. Then he attacks the wall until he's bloody. The familiar pain provides momentary relief. Then he remembers Sam and pukes his guts out.

Finally, he settles. He never zones out again. Every moment in Hell following Sam's departure burns acutely in his memory. Desperate to reclaim focus and some measure of control, he cuts a deal with Alastair. No more drugs. In exchange, he turns into a monster.

Dean never figures out whether he imagined Sam's presence or Alastair engineered it. He just knows he broke—Sam wasn't actually there.


	9. Epilogue (Ruby)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tainted blood: Dean falls upwards through the mirror and he's climbing into the sky and into Sam's arms. Sam, who is not—for those few moments of sight before Dean's tumbled back to Hell, Sam happens not to be—Dean's brother
> 
> Hopped up on demon blood and unexpectedly confronted with his beautiful, dead brother, whose absence has tunneled a hole through his spirit, Sam finds he cannot control his twisted need.
> 
> Coda: Ruby reveals her plan.

_Then_

 

It's in the blood: Lucifer's curse. It mutters through her veins, whispering obscenity, and she throws her head back and screams.

When Sam drinks her blood, she sees flashes of the future.

 

Dean bouncing on the mattress, flailing out. Pushing up on his hands and knees, then freezing, feeling Sam, all Power and confidence behind him.

Ruby could hear His tainted blood coursing through Sam's veins.

Dean hears it too. Can't do 40 years Below without knowing that ancient whisper, which echoes through Hell's corridors at night.

And still, Dean tries to reason. _Heart of gold_ , Ruby thinks viciously. Dean Winchester, miraculously still fighting. Watching him, something stirred in her, some flash-flicker of doubt, gone in an instant, but breathing its heavy perfume into her ear all the same.

_This fight won't go down like we planned it. Take the Righteous Man out._

But that was crazy talk: Dean was about to get raped. _Not even a threat!_ She thought wildly.

She watched, satisfied, as the Boy King shoved the Righteous Man down and violated him, over and over, an endless dance through Dean's nightmares.

She picked the roses that were wet with Dean's blood as his gasping cries echoed through the foothills. She sang,

 _Heart of Gold, Heart of Glass. You'll be taken, you won't last. You're the moon, underground. Dead and buried make no sound._  
  
She collected the flowers to her bosom and they glowed an eerie jade in the gathering night.

 _Glow away, pretty, hopeful bitch_ , she thought. _If you're lucky, Lucifer will spare you to be his whore._

The next night her eyes were opened and she dreamed again. The roses she clutched poked through her skin, and the tiny trickles of blood looked black in the growing light. The flowers glowed jade, radiant, then blinding. She shrieked as her arms caught fire and the green light pierced her soul-for to dream, you must have a soul, and to rise she had taken one on loan.

The last thing she saw was Sam and Dean, standing barefooted in the river, only a few yards from one another. They turned to face each other. Stars erupted overhead, and everything went very black.

She never dreamed again after that. The breath of the Morning Star rattled through her lung cage, but it tasted like the stale expired wind of a fallen king.

The bile rose in his throat, but then it dimmed and cooled, ichor melting to a chilly jade.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Dean blinked. Water and icy blood (his own) trickled through the grooves on the cold stone floor. Felt good against his face.  
A hand on his chest. he flopped back, spreadeagled, facing up, splayed in the cardinal direction of the closed heavens.

He never begged, just rolled over for his daily routine, imagining that was Sam's cock in him. Picturing getting screwed by his little brother. Totally a normal fantasy once the hounds have dragged you off to the Kingdom.

Today was his thirtieth Hell-birthday. Today marked the time he'd been in hell longer than he'd ever been on earth.

His eyes fluttered open. "Alastair." He smiled, pleased to see a familiar face.

***

"Sammy, wait, let's just think about this, huh?"  
"All right."  
Dean, slapping his hand away.  
"Dean,"  
"Sam?"  
Sam, trembling. Shaking like a leaf. Reminding Dean of when he was so small.  
"Ssh. It's okay, Sammy."  
"Dean..."  
Sammy's voice, breaking.  
"Dean-"  
Sam nodding resolutely.  
"No!"  
Crying out together. It hurt. Dragging pain, thrusting. Then something ripped between his legs and he bled freely. Sam's cock slid home through the sting of it. A hoarse yell tore out of Dean's throat.  
"Dean!"  
Sam's chest at his back, shoving both of them down, blanketing Dean as he screws him. Sam's nose pressed into the soft flesh under the base of his skull and Dean smelled Here, understood the moment which somehow broke through his hallucinations. _This is our first time together_ , he thought. _This is it_.  
_I imagined the rest._  
Sam's hands slide over his, lacing their fingers together under Dean's trembling body. He realizes his brother is saying things, mouth and soul speaking different languages.  
Remembers to focus through the pain.

Fuck you for dying.  
_Missed you so bad._  
So hot like this.  
_Don't know what I'm doing right now._  
Dean.  
_I'm sorry._

A low, broken sob by his ear: _Dean, I think I'm cursed. You damned us both_. His cock slides faster, shoves all the way in, and holds there, pulsing.

While Sam's busy puking his guts out, Dean smells blood and sulfur.

_Bless me, Father, for I have sinned._

***

Body purified, soul desecrated, Dean rose.

He climbed out of his grave.

His thoughts were eerie at first: all jarred and sticky.

Station there. My cross. Plants collapsed under the weight of sky blue. They died for you, Dean, so you could come back.

Gabriel's voice: _Play your role._

Sounds like a screaming radio. Building and shaking blood from his head. Drips out one ear.

Went to Bobby first. Sam was Not Safe. Didn't want to go to Sam alone.

Blue said trouble and blue was honest. Right about rising right about undying.

Protecting? Blue tried, but Dean was safe Below. Sammy was Not Safe.

Dad's voice: _Now, Dean! Go!_

Sammy was Not Safe and needed his older brother to watch out for him.

Maybe his thoughts smoothed out, or maybe he just got used to them, because he never noticed Them after hearing that sound.

***

"Dean are you really here?"

Sam's crying. They're close, touching,

"how could you leave me like that."

The kiss tastes like blood. Dean tries to ground himself.  _This time, Hell is the dream._   But, after Hell, nothing seems real. Nothing present.

Sam pulls out. Dean lies immobile. Blood and semen trickle out. Dean taps into that divine calm he learned in Hell. He hears the sound of Sam retching, and forgives him. Drops back into the deep mirror of his mind.

Later he stirs and his brother's gone. He's folded next to Sam's body, his pants still twisted around his knees. Someone has cleaned between his legs, rubbed something cool on the outer wound. And his little brother is absent, away with the shadows.

Sam's eyes chase phantoms under his lids. The fretful motion burrows under Dean's skin as his brother's body and Absence breathe next to him.

It's cold.

***

Slowly, he comes to terms.

For forty years, demons drugged, raped, and tortured him in Hell. In his agony, he invented a relationship with his brother that never existed in fact. His sanity slipped away until he couldn't tell: _dream, delusion_. Now he has returned to earth, miraculously still in his time, mind plagued by hallucinations, to discover the brother whom he died to save has been irrevocably changed.

He buries his face in his hands, not sure what he came back to.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Now_

 

"I fucked him."

She doesn't have to ask who, but Sam tells her anyway.

"My brother. I fucked Dean."

A beat. Ruby tries to think of something to say. "Why?"

"I just… god I thought he was dead? I had so many dreams this summer. Of his return."

Tears in his voice and not in his eyes.

"I just. Didn't stop myself."

"You dreamed of fucking Dean."

He nods.

"When you and I-?"

"Every time."

It stings, though she knows he's lying. After the first month, it wasn't Dean's name he screamed when he fucked her. She climaxed, the greatest ecstasy she'd ever known flowing from that tall, vicious devil.

And now Sam's darkening her door again. Needs his fix. Needs to fuck, too—can't fuck precious Dean again. Did too much damage the first time.

So Ruby forgives him. She knows from experience that he won't balk at snapping her neck if he needs it, to work out his little rage issues.

She delivered the Sacred Gift through her blood as per Lucifer's instructions. She gifted Sam with false memories of fucking Dean in hell. Not that it was a total fabrication, from what she heard. She almost felt sorry for that pretty, pretty boy.

He'd died for a good cause, Dean had. Died for his brother, who would be King.

Lucifer's gift came to Sam in dreams, oozing corruption into his mind. Some of it flashed across Ruby's vision too when he drank her: Dean naked, bleeding, begging. On his knees before the Boy King. On his back, legs spread, taking his punishment from Alastair the Corrupter, wearing Sammy's face.

 _That old wasp_ , she thought, _twisting the ages Below into the art of pain._ Alastair fought a petty war against boredom. He didn't know how to love like her King. She'd survive to see his downfall.

Despite herself, Ruby had been jealous, the way Dean waltzed in, skin immaculately unblemished, glowing, covered in dirt but still the only thing Sam could see.

She pretended she didn't know who Dean was. New meatsuit, so he didn't recognize her.

Then, just to check, she drawled the question, "So are you two, like… _together_?"

And Sam was out of his head, explaining that Dean was his brother like she didn't know, before zeroing in on him again, soul to soul, hands on Dean's waist, eyes on his mouth.

Sam looked at him like he could fuck him with his eyes. Dean had flushed and smiled softly, eyes vulnerable, fuckable, and they were already in their own world together.

Sam had just torn Ruby's pants off when the knock came.

 _Screw Dean for barging in like that_ , she thought. _Bastard deserved what they did to him in Hell._

The worst part of it was, she couldn't untangle the lust from the aching love and the visceral need in their eyes when they looked at each other. She didn't know how she was supposed to get between them at all.

She'd run out the door without her bra. Fucking cockblock older brother. But her work was complete: she'd given Sam the blood, gotten him horny… and, she supposed, Dean had showed up, all back from the dead, at the perfect moment.

Then she'd doubled back, just to see what had happened.

Sam opened the window and she curled outside it, perched just out of sight on the sill like a gargoyle.

 _Bobby left._ Of course he did _, she thought, the way they were looking at each other. Like they needed to get a fucking room._

_Sam cried. Dean told him it was all right, like he couldn't see the lust in his little brother's eyes. Maybe he carefully chose to ignore it as Sam stepped closer. They kissed through his tears, Sam leaning into him heavily, squeezing him like he thought he might vanish._

_The rest of it happened fast. Dean wiped Sam's tears away and Sam kissed him harder, Dean raking fingers through Sam's hair, when Sam slipped his tongue in, and Dean made a tiny helpless noise. She could see her partner snap; knew the moment his blood boiled from all the times she'd taunted him into fucking her, imaging it was rape, the way he shoved her head down and took her from behind. Gut twisting, smoke rattling through her meatsuit when he panted out Dean's name in time with the thrusts._

_Lucifer had some powerful mojo._

_And Sam was strong enough—nearly wrecked enough—to contain him. Their perfect unity hummed already through the strings of time. Her Lord, the Dark to Sam's Light. Yin and motherfucking Yang._

_Dean stammered confused questions like the new virgin he was, making her sick with his denial of what was happening. Sam walking forward and Dean stumbling back, their bodies moving in tandem as they crossed the room._

_Dean asking, "Sammy? What're you doing?" like he didn't know._

__Sam throwing him down on the bed._ Wrenching his pants and underwear down, nails leaving red scratches down his immaculate, porcelain white ass and thighs.  
_

_Sam unzipping his own fly._

_"Sammy no."  
_

_Spitting in his palm._

_"Sammy please!"  
_

_Hand caressing the top of Dean's head, then fisting in his hair, yanking him up off his elbows so Ruby couldn't see the moment Sam entered him._

_She couldn't see much else because they were both mostly clothed, facing her. Couldn't tell whether Dean was hard under the loose ends of his shirt._

_Knew Sam was hard. Thanks to her, Sam had been hard before Dean even knocked on the door._

_Dean shut his eyes and they both gasped together. Sam's hand came out from between them to splay low under Dean's shirt. He twisted Dean's head to the side and bit into his neck, and Dean moaned through gritted teeth._

Dean, you submissive bitch _, she thought venomously. Little brother's beautiful, broken slave._

_Slow shove of Sam's hips, Dean crying out at the impossible stretch._

_Dean was her brother now, too. She also knew what it was like to be Hellbroken. She also knew what it was like to be dicked by Sam fucking Winchester._

_Oh, the blessed pain that was so prized over the Eternal Empty of the Pit!_

_The pain of pyramids._

_She'd seen enough. Her heart drummed in her stolen chest as she raced through back alleys and raindamp streets, water misting through her trance like a baptism._

***

Ruby worked efficiently. She'd clear the radar of hunts. Let the dark fathoms of Dean's insanity wash over them both. Let Sam stew in the realization that he'd raped his own brother. Disappear herself so he had a chance to sober up, to fathom the darkness inside himself before crawling into her arms again.

Suddenly the future rushed towards them all—Heaven's downfall, The One Design.

The Apocalypse.

All Sam needed was time. When his soul understood what he'd done to his brother, its light would flicker. Regret would dig into his sacred places and hollow him out. Ruby would fill the gaps with His blood—both demoniac and divine. Sam would become the perfect vessel.

And the boy-king would reign with the fallen star of morning over the flaming dawn.

She crossed herself backwards for Lucifer. They would take this earth.

 

 

 


End file.
